Anti-BAM nerf suggestion and video!

Alright, let's be real EME, almost nobody wants the BAMs to be nerfed to regular mob status like they were in KTERA, there's 5x the people telling you to buff them rather than nerf in that petition thread, that thread is full of stories and paragraphs of reasons why people don't want BAMs nerfed as well not just people writing "/signed".

We also know questing in this game is BAD, it's actually more along the lines of AWFUL. So, here's me once again, killing two birds with one stone with my awesome suggestions.

Make it so mobs do not grant less xp when partying with other players in your level range, whether it is one person or five, killing mobs should give the same amount of EXP, this isn't a single player RPG. This change will do multiple things:

1) Encourage more people to group up and socialize, not just for BAMs but in general, since grouping will essentially be faster instead of a hindrance in any scenario, nobody wants to group with a mystic for example because they take xp and provide minimal dps. This is an MMO, don't discourage grouping, encourage it!

2) It will create an alternative means of leveling other than quest grinding, which along with enchanting has been labelled one of TERAs worst features. The archaic run around talk to twenty people all scattered all over the place alongside the quest hub system is bad, it really is painful to experience. BAM grinding with a good group of people would actually be faster than questing if XP was not destroyed for being in a large party, personally, I would get a few friends and we'd BAM grind level 18 all the way to level 60 in a heartbeat, would be so much more fun than questing and actually motivate me to level an alt.

It's a simple fix, it really is, you just remove the XP cuts for being partied with people, solo or with five people it's all the same, no reason to ever say no to that lonely quester asking to group or fight a BAM.

Lastly, here's a video to show you even before TERA has gone F2P I can still find people to group with me for BAMs. These are videos taken over the last two days while questing:

Nobody understands why, but currently BAMs in KTERA have been made soloable by mystics in a relatively timely fasion, they enrage less, when they enrage they drop mana and HP orbs, their "red glint" attacks have been significantly reduced in damage, most poison dots have been removed and some of the harder to predict attacks have been removed.

BAMs are now basically normal mobs that look cooler and take a bit longer to kill.

As a completely new player to TERA, I completely agree with the OP. BAM's should not be nerfed, as they are one of the things this game does correctly. They are hard to deal with and they should be. The most fun I have had in the game is attempting challenging runs at taking on BAM's with either 2 people or solo, and succeeding. If you make them into semi normal mobs with more health it will suck all the fun out of it. Hell I would even like to see "hardmode" BAMs that are a level above what we have now.

I have to also agree with giving the same amount of XP to everyone whether they are solo or in a party for BAM kills. It will encourage playing in groups and increase the fun for one of the best parts of the game.

I dont see the purpose for nerfing them. Nobody did them to begin with, and now theyre lowering the exp reward? Gee, that will sure help. How would you like to fight a dumbed down AI, and have little exp reward? I still dont get why developers still cut exp kills when youre in a party. Its just so stupid, it promotes anti-party behavior at lower lvls. Exp for kills should be the same as soloing or boosted, to cut exp when you promote party play for something like that that gives big exp, but it gets cut so much that it barely matters is just rediculous.

They should just massively increase the EP gained from killing them. Questing is terrible anyway in this game. Well, actually they should just do what OP proposed. It's a very good idea and it would be a good solution to the awful leveling.

For the record, I doubt anyone does bams for xp gain. Seriously, leveling pace is not what is problematic in Tera (aside being compeltely meaningless / pointless and paritally responsbile for ruining the game, but that's different subject).

BAMs itself provide little to zero incentives (even more so in NA/EU, no eggs here after all), their difficulty (in NA/EU) is already laughable for anything but solo/duo, and the time it often takes to form a group (to floor bams in a matter of a few minutes) is larger than what it takes to solo them. Once someone is in better T12 they are hardly challenging for anyone or worthwile to bother with (comparing to instance farming).

KR "team" probably tried to "address" that - which ended with dumbest, unimaginative, halfassed approach possible (yet so typical for them) - turn them into trash with large hitbox, so people can "enjoy" them. That's generally their logic looking at past few years of Tera.

There are very simple ways to make BAMs interesting, challenging and viable (while also providing faceroll mode, should someone wants it). I mentioned those in the main bam thread (autoscaling, selectable difficulty+first hit, etc.). Then make them e.g. drop parts for crafting crystals, remove all crystalbinds and crystal drops, make sure the crystal break ratio is proper, and you have good thing going (with natural decay).

That's because they are not worth doing, hence why I said you shouldn't have XP cut for being in a party, that would make BAM grinding a more fun and faster alternative to quest grinding, it would also encourage people to party in general, improving social aspects is one of the most important things an MMO can do, the people I met while leveling I still play with today, if I didn't meet those people I wouldn't have a reason to play TERA anymore.

Solo'ing BAMs is about as much XP as a quest turn in, but it takes longer to solo BAMs than do your average quest sadly, but if you could get the same amount of XP for killing a BAM in a party of 5 as a quest, well then, how many people would use BAMs to level up rather than quests? I know I would that's for sure, TERAs poorly organized quest system drives me insane. Too much running and horribly inconsistent XP rewards adds insult to injury on an already poor design.

Well, even if they went this route, they would have to clean up some "trash prerequisite" quests first either way - if they were to serve as an alternative to trash. Can you see them doing it ? :p

But yea I agree - having both as alternatives, there's no competition. There's lots of options too (overlapping with whatever vision I have) - like e.g. bams in groups of 2, bams spawning adds, etc.

Though I'd rather see some better incentives than just exp gain (which personally I try to avoid, as standard trash genocide quests already give too much - looking at my $5 amazon bait run with "returnee" warrior).

Yea, 100% standard 3-types-of-quests stuff with korean bull[filtered] on top - for all the bad reasons. Then again, I'd rather see leveling removed completely as it serves no purpose either way (besides self-obsoleting in a matter of what - 1 - 4 weeks ?). Again, different subject.